Yes, both Morrison and Douglass certainly contain multitudes! I appreciated your old essay on the Narrative and found intriguing the assertion that Douglass argues between the lines for something like a natural aristocracy. LOL I'm a zillennial who moves in spaces that are relatively progressive, and I've been hearing a lot of "my baby boomer parents are hysterical" complaints, even from people who are themselves freaked out, think black bagging is not unlikely etc. I've always been ambivalently fascinated by your implication, which somehow never becomes a formal statement despite its insistence and recurrence, that the radical turn of the humanities was a fatal mistake that has doomed the whole enterprise of the western academy.
My boomer "associates," while mostly quiescently pro-Trump, are a little worried about the economic strategy! They didn't go to college, though, and couldn't care less about anything related to that subject—probably they think the professors have it coming. This isn't a prediction, but I think the black bagging, if it happens, will happen in a post-9/11 or maybe post-02/24/22 type emotional environment where people we wouldn't necessarily expect will be fine or more than fine with it. There was a way to do the radical turn without contributing to this result—see my defense of Hawthorne against Sacvan Bercovitch—but I also admit that doesn't mean the radicals, including the radical reactionaries, were wrong.
Per this prediction: "I doubt it will be done inside the institutions as presently constituted" -- beyond your own Invisible College, have you watched any new attempts at humanistic study outside the universities with interest?
I'm thinking (from within the biases of my own reading) of Justin Smith-Ruiu's Hinternet as it extends into nonprofit status, and of the analog Matthew Strother Center for the Examined Life.
I sometimes read the Hinternet, and also sometimes watch Interintellect material, if they're in the same zone you're thinking about. I probably pay more attention to the individualistic and more "disreputable" side, the "programs" that don't even really look like the old institutions. I like John David Ebert, Steve Donoghue, Michael Sugrue (before he died). When Hollis Robbins said all educational institutions need to think about what they can offer than AI can't, my response was simply, the personality of the educator. So I think in general the near-term future of the rebuilding will be personalistic, individualistic, maybe even cult-like, as it was at the beginning with the schools of antiquity.
Yes, both Morrison and Douglass certainly contain multitudes! I appreciated your old essay on the Narrative and found intriguing the assertion that Douglass argues between the lines for something like a natural aristocracy. LOL I'm a zillennial who moves in spaces that are relatively progressive, and I've been hearing a lot of "my baby boomer parents are hysterical" complaints, even from people who are themselves freaked out, think black bagging is not unlikely etc. I've always been ambivalently fascinated by your implication, which somehow never becomes a formal statement despite its insistence and recurrence, that the radical turn of the humanities was a fatal mistake that has doomed the whole enterprise of the western academy.
My boomer "associates," while mostly quiescently pro-Trump, are a little worried about the economic strategy! They didn't go to college, though, and couldn't care less about anything related to that subject—probably they think the professors have it coming. This isn't a prediction, but I think the black bagging, if it happens, will happen in a post-9/11 or maybe post-02/24/22 type emotional environment where people we wouldn't necessarily expect will be fine or more than fine with it. There was a way to do the radical turn without contributing to this result—see my defense of Hawthorne against Sacvan Bercovitch—but I also admit that doesn't mean the radicals, including the radical reactionaries, were wrong.
Per this prediction: "I doubt it will be done inside the institutions as presently constituted" -- beyond your own Invisible College, have you watched any new attempts at humanistic study outside the universities with interest?
I'm thinking (from within the biases of my own reading) of Justin Smith-Ruiu's Hinternet as it extends into nonprofit status, and of the analog Matthew Strother Center for the Examined Life.
I sometimes read the Hinternet, and also sometimes watch Interintellect material, if they're in the same zone you're thinking about. I probably pay more attention to the individualistic and more "disreputable" side, the "programs" that don't even really look like the old institutions. I like John David Ebert, Steve Donoghue, Michael Sugrue (before he died). When Hollis Robbins said all educational institutions need to think about what they can offer than AI can't, my response was simply, the personality of the educator. So I think in general the near-term future of the rebuilding will be personalistic, individualistic, maybe even cult-like, as it was at the beginning with the schools of antiquity.
My head is spinning…it’s not the coffee. Another great read.
Thank you!